Echo CS-355t muffler mod and review

Here you go bud. Figured I'd just start a new thread on it:

Echo CS-2511

 

Couldn’t stand sitting around any longer had to go tinker a bit this morning.
Previous owner had tried a drill bit in the deflector then fattened the heck out of the carb leaving the inside of the exhaust full of tar. It started melting the plastic I went for a bit more like this. Used part of the old deflector which is paper thin and a pia to work with and a piece of 3/4” emt. Also removed a fair amount of the deflector. Assembled with a bit of plastic massage

Figured if it comes out easier probably should see how things go in on the other end. This plastic under the filter seemed a bit restrictive to me so I took it out. Also under the starter cover there’s a little passageway that is supposed to “charge” the air box off the flywheel. It’s pretty small and doesn’t seem to line up real well so I did some massaging to the plastic in there too.

Haven’t got the chance to cut with it yet but it starts, revs and sounds great!

 

All the talk of the little 2511 got me thinking about the 355....When I realized I’ve only got the bar and chain that’s on it?!
Barcroftb and Scotty Overkill what have you guys got on yours for bar and chain? I’m noticing it’s next to impossible to get 3/8 lp in full chisel.

 

Guy writes post about bar and chain. Guy then goes out to clear some saplings around willow tree to make nice climbing area with above mentioned saw. Guy proceeds to throw and wreck chain on a grapevine getting sucked into said saw.

 

I did the same thing with my CS 352, wrecked the chain, Trying to cut yew Bushes

 

For full chis on that saw your best bet is the 10 loop deal from bailey's. The woodland pro is a rebranded carlton chain. I like it.

WoodlandPRO 63RC Chainsaw Chain | Chisel Chainsaw Chain (3/8" LoPro x .050") | Husqvarna Chainsaws, Outdoor Power Equipment and Tree Care Supplies from Bailey's

 

I was poking around on there today! How’d I miss that!

Anything as far as different bars? Still 16”...

 

I cant remember if the 355 has a 14 or a 16 on it. I run the same stuff on my 201 with a 16" bar. It feels like low rent stihl chain to me. I like it.

 

Yeah the muffs on 330's/360's are pretty tight but IME that's more the norm than anything...will never understand how echo was making those saws as recently as they were WITHOUT clutch-driven oilers(since the invention of a clutch-driven oiler, you'd think any saw that was to have a belt-loop would be clutch-driven, seems frickin' obvious to me, was blown away when I re-did a 330t and found it wasn't 'broken' but oiled-while-on by design, still was gonna keep the pawn-unit but it had an air-leak and wasn't worth it so returned it. Had same clutch-covering plastic as a 360t and the 355t that I went and got [new] after returning the 'steal' on the 330t I'd thought I'd gotten, hadn't been planning to get my 355 til my 32cc climb-saw crapped out

Seeing your signature I've gotta ask your thoughts on a sentiment I've begun having.... My contention is basically that the "best climbing saw" title is a false-paradigm (ie "right tools for right jobs", you want a different saw when limbing than when blocking down a stem), I have 12"//14"//16" climb saws but my contention is "optimal" really just requires (2) saws, the echo 355t with a 16" setup and an echo 2511t with a 12", using the 2511 to start jobs then the 355 then rear-handles when you get low enough on the trunk.

With lithium units going so well, I don't suspect I'll ever buy a sub-30cc powerhead ever again, barring some ridiculous deal on a 2511t, so will never get to test my thought in real life but curious if you'd feel you could do basically anything, in an optimal fashion, with just a 355 & 2511 (until 16" bar was insufficient)?

 

Interesting, have actually heard the opposite ie am hearing more anecdotes that the 330/360/355 benefit from timing-advances more-than the average saw (and also that they benefit FAR less from porting due to the "long block design" although I'm outta my depth talking on that, hell I'm still uncertain how altering timing has *any* effect I would think that, at that speed of RPM and with a fixed 1-click-per-revolution, that the flywheel//ignition mating was just an RPM's thing and that 'angle'/degrees of timing would almost be irrelevant...have sought good explanations, ie "understanding the timing-advance mod for dummies" but am yet to get an understanding..)

That said....how could the rev-limiter matter? The rev-limiter isn't kicking-in while you're cutting with the saw (ie in-the-cut) it's preventing it from flying to 15k+ when you're coming out of a cut, when you're barrelling through a 15" log with your 16" bar you're not going anywhere near the limiter but your muff mod/air intake mod/etc are most-certainly allowing higher torque and maintenance of a higher relative RPM at any given level of resistance from the log.

Re "leaned on it pretty good and couldn't stall it out", yeah I was very very impressed with mine / have had same experience, I hardly put 10hr on it before doing a "round 2" tear apart for more m0ds but jeeeebus it eats wood (and I put my 16" "Oregon Versacut" on it immediately since my dealer only had it in 14", and I'd been using a 32cc/16" as my 'big climb saw'), it does get hot-as-hell when doing so in fact that was my last-usage before its 2nd tear-down (and it just got rebuilt/finished again yesterday!) because I wanted to address the heat, I felled an old/dead Live Oak stump(~17', 2/3rd decayed) and began chunking it up and had to keep switching to my 42cc/18(poulan pro 4218a, modded of course, stronger than my 355t for sure) because of heat-buildup on the 355, think it got ~15-20% of that trunk and the poulan 42cc did the rest and I was aiming to use it as-much-as-possible on that job, and yes it was tuned rich for this / muffler wasn't restricting it, things just get HOT! Hopefully the new mods - many of which are heat/cooling related- make a difference here!!

 

For sure!! I've modded every muffler on any gear I've owned(of course), have never seen a muffler like the 355t hell not even my 1977 poulan 25d has that level of nothing-ness in the muffler, literally just a box..

Barcroftb-- something I hope you caught while you had it apart... The muffler's intake port, as well as the heat-shield and the lil gasket-piece(if you re-use that, I do not, just that big heat-shield plate and Permatex-red), all of those are smaller than the block's exhaust-outlet, so even if you fully-open the front-facing of the muff you still have restriction from the muffler by virtue of the 'mating' areas between muff&block all being {very slight, but definitely there!} smaller circumferences than the block outlet-port they're mated to!
[also, can I ask what the thinking is in "How big should the opening on that front-restricter-plate be"? IE, with mine, I looked at the hole the restricter-plate was covering, that big opening on front-face of muffler, and found it was nicely ~10-15% larger than the muff's intake-hole, meaning full removal of the restricter should be enough to allow zero back-pressure since some is introduced via turbulence in that can, so the muff's final exit-port should be a bit larger circumference than its intake-port, no? Am genuinely uncertain, I'm pretty sure that zero back-pressure (and zero suction/restriction at the air-intake box) IS the optimal for these lil 2-strokes, am awaiting confirmation on that from another site/thread, but if so then simply removing the restricter plate should do it, I've got a looser-mesh-grid spark-arrester over my muff-outlet, just to prevent solids entering it, but it's otherwise 'wide open' -

[that red on the side of the clutch-cover is Permatex, nice heat-shield since the muff-covering has an open-face on that side so there's plenty of room if you mind the mounting-locations for fitment! Also used the red-Permatex "as a paint" on the inside-face of the plastic muffler-covering so it'll scorch less, my 'design' here should still have some 'downward-push' but is mostly just gonna spew exhaust wherever it wants!]


[edited-to-add: realized picture shows some of the 'feeties' I put on all my climb-saws so they don't slam the ground so hard when on impermeable grounds[asphalt/crete/etc], regular 5min epoxy is more-than sufficient and I use brake-&carb-cleaner sprays liberally / as my go-to manner of cleaning a saw after any usage so am very impressed the epoxy holds rubber feet, have only had one ever fall-off on me and it was >1yr old and on my most-used saw!]

 

VERY much so!! The intake is, thankfully, not the plastic-coffin that so many top-handles are, but like-usual the air-induction openings (bottom-edging of the air-box's shell, there's 5 lil rectangular slots, and the H&L jets' hole...sad when *that* is a notable part of your air-filter's air-access :/ And before people say "but that lil tube from the flywheel-area is putting pressurized air into the 'plastic coffin', it may be hot air but it's almost 'boosted' because the flywheel is forcing it in there", I'd thought that myself until I thought "what is this "g-force" cleaning thing echo says my saw has?" and I looked and saw their video showing the airflow of the saw is PULLING air through that tube, not feeding it! So that 'plastic coffin' is actually under-vacuum already, before the air-filter's suction is accounted for!!

This kinda restricted-airflow is so pervasive, can only imagine it's part of the "muffler/throughput dumbing-down" package done for EPA because they're so easily by-passed, the 355t's muffler seemed ready-made for this, but the air-box needed real work:

[sry no pics of it on-saw/finished but it's just metal-mesh as structure put in with epoxy, and then I put loose-foam in with permatex, this is my go-to way of modding air-boxes and has worked great on all my units thus far ]

Hate having to clean an air-filter more-than-necessary, no reason not to have pre-filters for air entering your saw.....am surprised/upset that it was my ebay/amazon $135 saw that had this feature but a rubber-plug for H&L to block-off that unfiltered port, and screening the 355's "real" air-inlets, was all that was needed for more&cleaner air:

 

I’d say your right. You can do everything you would want to do with a top handle saw with that pair. I’m sure even more than they are intended for too! 16” bar on the 355 and a narrow kerf 14 or 12 on the 2511.
As a side note.... I tried the 1/4 pitch set up on my 2511 and wasn’t happy with it. So if anyone wants to try it I’ve got the stuff to do it.